Born at Mistley, Essex on 28 October 1925, he grew up in Norwich, where he formed a lifelong friendship with Norwyn Denny. During World War II he served on mobile canteen run by the Church Army behind Allied lines in Europe. He trained for the ministry at Richmond College and spent one year under Reinhold Niebuhr at Union Theological College, New York, while serving in the East Harlem Protestant parish. From 1962 to 1971 he was a member of the Notting Hill team ministry. His Christmas hymn 'Born in the night' (HP 95; SF 193) was first published in Songs from Notting Hill. A period of depression in the 1970s led to his withdrawal from the ministry, but he was reinstated in 1984 and served for eight years at Orpington before his retirement first to Manningtree and then to Lichfield. His developing understanding of Christian faith was expressed in his book Jesus our Contemporary (1967). He died on 4 January 2013.

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